As a semiconductor processing apparatus, there is known a single-substrate type processing apparatus in which a FOUP (Front-Opening Unified Pod) is mounted on a mounting unit and a multiple number of processing modules perform parallel processes on substrates taken out of the FOUP. As an example of such substrate processing apparatus, a substrate cleaning apparatus configured to clean a substrate includes a mounting unit configured to mount thereon a multiple number of FOUPs; a multiple number of cleaning modules configured to perform a two-fluid cleaning process by supplying a mixture fluid of a gas and a cleaning liquid onto a target surface of a substrate or to perform a scrub cleaning process by bringing a scrubber such as a brush into contact with the target surface of the substrate that is rotating; and a transfer system configured to transfer substrates between the processing modules and the FOUPs.
A cleaning module configured to perform multiple kinds of processes is capable of performing the multiple kinds of the processes in combinations or capable of performing only a part of the multiple kinds of the processes depending on, e.g., a kind of a substrate or a required cleanness degree. Meanwhile, there may occur a trouble that it is difficult to perform only a part of the multiple kinds of the processes.
In Patent Document 1, there is described a technique for dealing with a trouble when one of a multiple number of processing units is out of order in a substrate processing apparatus in which the processing units perform a same process in parallel. In this technique, when one of the multiple number of the processing units is broken, a substrate supposed to be transferred into the broken processing unit is transferred into another processing unit instead and a required process is performed therein. Patent Document 1, however, does not describe a technique for dealing with a problem that a part of multiple kinds of processes malfunctions in a processing module configured to perform the multiple kinds of processes.    Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. H11-016983 (Claim 1, paragraphs [0027] and [0028], and FIG. 4)